"The guy in your picture? Who is he?" Sawyer inquired.
"He's my brother" Kali replied.
"Gonna need more than that if you want those inhalers" Sawyer insisted.
"You have to promise me you won't tell anyone" Kali exclaimed.
"Trust me, if there's one thing I can do, it's keep a secret" Sawyer told her.
"…His name is Ken Dixon. And before you say it, yes that Ken Dixon" Kali sighed, after mulling it over for a few seconds.
"As in the Bullet Killer? That's your brother?" Sawyer questioned, his eyes wide, clearly not expecting that.
"Yep. My real name is Kalista Dixon" She announced.
"Kalista?" Sawyer laughed, unable to keep it in as she rolled her eyes.
"Okay, okay, laugh it up. You can see why I changed it when I was younger" Kali groaned.
"Were you parents' hippies or something?" Sawyer suggested, trying to contain his laughter.
"My mum's grandmother was called Kalista, I guess she liked the name" Kali shrugged.
"I remember one of my girlfriends would barely leave the house when they thought the Bullet Killer was in the US. I kept telling her it's a big damn country, but it didn't make any difference" Sawyer exclaimed.
"He only stayed in the US a couple of weeks. I guess he realised there were too many people looking for him" Kali mumbled.
"Hold up, when it first came out that he was the Bullet Killer, he was young. Really young. But you must have been even younger" Sawyer stated.
"I was nine when he got found out" Kali replied.
"I won't pretend that I know much about the case…but I do remember that they said his sister helped him" Sawyer announced, unable to keep the accusatory tone out his voice.
"There's more to the story. Everything was pretty normal with our family up until I was about eight. My brother had just turned thirteen and was acting weirdly. He had always been a bit…eccentric but he would barely talk to me and he'd always go out somewhere after school. I don't know, maybe I was jealous, but one day I decided to follow him home from school. But…he didn't leave. He just went to this old building on the site that was under construction...I smelt it before I saw it. There was a body right in the middle of the room. And my brother was just…staring at him. I tried to sneak away but he heard me…" Kali trailed off, her mind going back.
"Kali?" Ken called out, as he saw his little sister backing away from him.
"What…what happened?" She squeaked, as he approached her.
"Hey, it's okay. It's not what it looks like" Ken insisted, as Kali tried to edge towards the door, afraid.
"He's dead…you killed him!" Kali cried, seeing all the blood around the body.
"He was going to hurt me, Kali. Don't you recognise him? He's that man from down the street…the one who had all those rumours about him" Ken stated.
"Mum told me to stay away from him" Kali mumbled.
"And she was right too. He…he did things to kids. He was going to hurt me. I had to kill him. It was self-defence. He was a bad man" Ken explained.
"We should tell Mum and Dad" Kali suggested.
"No! No, you can't do that. You have to promise you'll never tell anyone. Not ever. Promise me!" Ken exclaimed, grabbing hold of her shoulders, roughly.
"I…I promise" Kali gulped, more scared of her brother than the consequences of what was in front of her.
"It's okay, Kali. Everything's going to be okay" He insisted, as he pulled her into a hug.
"And you believed him?" Sawyer questioned.
"I think so…this guy had a reputation. No one would miss him and I couldn't betray my brother" Kali explained.
"But I'm guessing it didn't stop there?" Sawyer suggested.
"I thought everything would go back to normal after that. But Ken was even colder, and he still was barely at home. So, I went back there…and there was another body. He told me that he couldn't help himself, that he just got angry and…lashed out. That the body I found him with wasn't the first one. I said I was going to tell our parents but he…he said if I ever told anyone he'd kill our little sister. He wouldn't even think twice" Kali grimaced, as Sawyer's eyes widened.
"I don't remember anything about him having another sister" Sawyer stated, getting a bad feeling.
"He was so angry with me after that. He started making me come along as he watched these people. He made me watch as he killed them. He tried to make me…I think he wanted me to kill so he'd feel normal. Like it was no big thing. But I couldn't do it. I was pretty messed up by that point that I barely noticed things that were happening in the rest of my life. I didn't even think about it when one of my teachers asked me to stay behind after school. He was a creep, but I didn't think he would try anything…I guess all the anger I had let build up with my brother just…came out. I grabbed a beaker that was near me and I smashed him over the head with it. I didn't mean to kill him. My brother had even more leverage after that, he said he'd blame all the killings on me if I told anyone. So, I started helping him…they were bad men. That's what I kept telling myself. Then when I was almost ten, he took one of the boys from his school…" Kali trailed off.
"This is wrong!" Kali cried, as Ken placed the knife into her hand.
"He beats up his little sister…he deserves it" Ken replied, as if it was nothing.
"He's no different than you" Kali spat out.
"Really? Okay, you're right. I'm a monster. And so are you" Ken stated.
"That's not true. I don't want to do this!" Kali exclaimed.
"That's bullshit, Kali. You're just like me" Ken told her.
"I'm nothing like you!" She shouted, gripping the knife harder in her hand.
"Go on then. Do it. Kill me. Go on!" Ken insisted, as he grabbed her hand and placed the knife against his throat.
"Stop it!" She cried, trying to pull her hand away.
"You want this to stop? There's only one way. You get one chance. Only one" Ken said, holding onto her hand so hard she was sure it would bruise.
"Stop…please…" She sobbed, as he let go of her with a huff.
"You're right, you are nothing like me. I could never be as pathetic as you" Ken mocked.
"I'm going to tell them. Mum and Dad. I'm going to tell everyone" Kali announced.
"I told you Kali, you had one chance to end this. And you didn't take it" He replied, making her frown.
Before she could say anything, his fist was suddenly flying towards her and then everything was black.
"When I woke up, he was gone, and the boy was dead. I rushed home, I was going to tell them everything. I didn't care about what would happen to me, I just needed to stop him. But the police were already there. I thought that maybe he had already turned himself in. But I was wrong. He had gone through with his promise. He had killed our sister…and our parents. And it was my fault. I told the police everything. I guess I was lucky, a few more months and I would have been charged for the all the other murders. Sometimes I wish I was…" Kali admitted.
"You were nine years old…there's nothing you could have done-" Sawyer started, but she cut him off.
"I could have killed him. I could have told the police the first time it happened. But I didn't" Kali sighed.
"You were a kid and made a mistake" Sawyer insisted.
"Why are you being so nice about this? I've killed people!" Kali argued.
"I'm not really in a place to judge. You're not the only person on this island that has killed people" Sawyer grimaced, as Kali realised what he was saying.
"Oh...Are you going to tell them?" Kali asked, a moment later.
"No" Sawyer shook his head.
"Maybe you should…they deserve to know" Kali suggested.
"I've known some pretty bad people in my life, but you ain't one of them, Kali" Sawyer reasoned, actually calling her by her name for once.
"Thank you" Kali sighed, not being able to keep the relief out of her voice.
It had been so good not having to deal with the usual looks of distrust and murmured comments behind her back since she got the island. She couldn't bear the thought of being trapped on an island full of people who knew what she had done.
"I don't have it" Sawyer blurted out.
"What?" Kali frowned.
"The medicine. I don't have it. I never did" Sawyer admitted, now feeling bad for lying about it and forcing to Kali to tell him such a big secret.
"You…son of a bitch. Jesus, I can't believe I actually believed you!" Kali exclaimed, loud enough that Jack and Sayid came running.
"What's going on?" Jack inquired.
"He doesn't have it" Kali sighed.
"He's lying. Can't you see that? He's been lying since the beginning. He doesn't want us to get off this island. That's why he attacked me" Sayid stated.
"Hold on a minute, now" Jack replied.
"He destroyed the transceiver!" Sayid exclaimed, looking vehemently at Sawyer.
"You don't know that!" Jack argued, as Sayid went to lunge for Sawyer.
Unbeknownst to the rest of them, Sawyer had been working on untying his hands, and just as Sayid approached him, he was able to get loose. He grabbed Sayid and wrestled him to the ground, trying to keep the knife in Sayid's hand away from him.
"Jack, untie me. Now!" Kali insisted, as Jack quickly did so.
Just as she got her hands free, she heard a loud scream from Sawyer and gasped when she saw Sayid had stabbed him in the arm.
"Sawyer!" She cried, as she rushed towards him.
"What the hell did you do?!" She yelled as she pushed Sayid away from him, shoving him in the chest.
"He's hit an artery" Jack exclaimed, his hand reaching to grab the handle.
"Wait! What are you doing? He's going to bleed out if you take it out now" Kali pointed out, grabbing his arm.
"Sayid I need my stuff from the caves. My leather backpack. Go!" Jack ordered, a disorientated Sayid.
Kali gave Jack a distrustful look, as she took off her shirt, leaving her in just a tank top. She knew that Jack would have to be aware that taking the knife out now would have been too dangerous. Was he trying to kill Sawyer, she couldn't help but wonder? She handed Jack her top who quickly wrapped it around the knife's edge to help stem the bleeding. Kali worried that it wouldn't be enough.
"Let go. I know you want to" Sawyer suggested.
"Shut up and stop moving" Jack retorted, pressing against his wound harder.
"You've been waiting for this, haven't you? Now you get to play the hero again, because that's what you do, fix everything up all nice" Sawyer goaded.
"Stop it, Sawyer" Kali exclaimed.
"Tell him to let go, blue eyes. I've got to see you with your shirt off, what else do I got to live for?" Sawyer went on, as Kali blushed lightly, thinking he was becoming delirious.
"If I take my tank top off too, will you shut up?" She replied, as Sawyer's eyes lit up mischievously.
"Maybe if you-" Sawyer started, but Jack cut him off.
"You're really going to flirt as you bleed to death? You two really don't quit, do you?" Jack rolled his eyes.
"Your one to talk…is there some clinical need that's causing you to keep staring at Kate's ass?" Kali smirked.
"She's got you there, Doc" Sawyer choked on a laugh, as things began spinning around him.
"Sawyer?" He heard Kali's worried voice call out before everything went black.
Author's Notes: I hope you all enjoyed this chapter! I feel like Kali's backstory turned into something more dramatic than I meant it to, but then again I think all the character's on Lost's backstories are a bit much, haha. Please leave a review:)
Juneselene: Aw, thank you so much for this review:) I'm really glad you're enjoying Sawyer and Kali's relationship, and I hope you are happy with Kali's backstory.